Monday, March 28, 2011

You keep using that word...

If you want a check from the government you are, by definition, not an "anarchist". Oh, you can call yourself an anarchist while clamoring for a dole cheque, there, Nigel... You can call yourself Princess Griselda or a Bengal tiger, too, but that don't necessarily make it so. You can't smash the state and expect an allowance from it at the same time.

Incidentally, if thousands of protesters in the streets proves a government isn't legitimate, how long before Barack calls for Cameron to step down and we declare a No-Fly Zone over London?

Some thing about all these riots and protests Stink of Leftists trying to shake up Society to bring about the New Soviet Man, 2011 version. Which White House Czar is responsible for the Facetube and Youbook Co-ordination of these events? "The World Wonders...."

The incense, beads and no-that's-really-not-paraphernalia store near Flat State U sold a button proclaiming "Anarchists - Unite!" I almost got one just to see if anyone else found it as funny as I did.

I think if you are willing to take the check but you want to tear down the government that sends it, you can still call yourself an anarchist. It is the next step to nirvana where you eschew all social structure and also refuse the check. That is nihilism.

Sorry, but "anarchy" means what it means, not what they want it to mean or what you want it to mean. I know they think it means "Cool!" and you think it means "Smelly Commies!", but really it just means "No Ruler". Which, by definition, means "No Dole Check".

"I think if you are willing to take the check but you want to tear down the government that sends it, you can still call yourself an anarchist. "

You can call yourself Napoleon Bonaparte, too, but that don't make it so.

It is so difficult to communicate when I've got my tongue planted so firmly in my cheek!

You are, of course, precisely correct. But in practice, the definition gets warped. It's sort of like "communist"--which classically leads to withering away of the state. In practice, however, it leads to monolithic state and a totally planned economy.

There is a lot more going on in the decay of British society than simply welfarism. The football hooligans, the binge drinking women of Wales, the multi-culturalism and the related cesspools of humanity in the slums, are all part of the package.

I think the term anarchist is valid as it describes advocacy for a stateless society while anarchy is an actual stateless society.

Though anarchy is defined as a society without a state there are various views by anarchists on how to achieve this. The people protesting were social anarchists who are basically communists (using the definition put forth by Karl Marx, where means of production are equally controlled by all people in a classless society).

They believe in things such as society providing the basic needs for survival for everybody (of course they can never can explain the economic method of doing this without a state to collect taxes to dole out to those who either don't want to or can't work). Thus they see the state as a necessary evil at the moment in order to provide basic needs to people.

So I believe they can accurately be called anarchists as they advocate a stateless society. Granted I think they're advocating something that is oxymoronic but alas I believe the label is valid due to what they advocate.

(Although, if they had really wanted to wind me up, they could have said: "Organizers of the demonstration hadn't, in their wildest expectations, imagined a crowd of this enormity. Later, when things got out of hand, shop windows were decimated...")

Tam - I'm glad am not the only one who gets annoyed at the misuse of the English language.

The news says "anarchists" because real Anarchists who wanted the government dissolved used violence over a century ago. Being leftists / statists themselves, the press doesn’t want to properly identify them as whining, parasitic socialists.

On the other hand, I am pleased that leftists are no longer called “liberals,” since they are the opposite.

...."More amusingly, is the number of people who fancy themselves "anarchists" and do not realize that anarchy (as opposed to rich kids destroying stuff in large groups to show how cool they are) is actually a worse situation than a government. In an anarchy, a bunch of masked kids running through a big city smashing in shop windows would be machine gunned or sold into slavery by the private security firms that would exist in a true anarchy."

And, my response to "rioters in the streets" is Tam's statement about how many magazines one needs: "More."

I'm waiting for the restart of school and the annual flood of papers on "How I Spent My Summer Vacation...." There's potential for some of them to be pretty interesting.

There are those that work and there are those siphon. Hence with this motley crew or rabble their revolution will be subsidized, that is until all the money runs out, then they will just eat their enablers. It always happens that way. As for Britain, they have had this coming for years. Sometimes the best lessons are the most painful.

Ok, so this "anarchists" are really conservative leftists. (i.e. they are some form of re-destributive morons who at the very least wish to conserve the status quo. How I would like the news to call them that to watch heads explode.)

And I get the impression a large fraction of the readers here are" progressive liberal with a modestly right wing bent."

i.e. open minded people fighting against the established left of centre power base and want to preserve or expand certain revolutionary idealogies.

A dollar or a pound has lost what, 90, 95% of its value over the last 40 years, and the "money" hasn't run out yet.

Look at it the other way, from the perspective of say 1970- everything costs ten times as much as then, and we're still perking along.

Zimbabwe is only a really accelerated version.

"The cuts will be made".

Ha ha, the cuts are a political decision. More than half the people subsist off government. Who is going to vote for his own 25% pay cut? What majority of politicians will be elected on a serious cut platform?

And when, ever, has it happened in the history of man that a democratically chosen government deflated its currency? Or even held the line for more than a couple of years?

The cuts will be made as productive people decide not to produce that which can be stolen. We see it now in Europe as the productive German birth rate drops. The mouchers and looters won't be able to enslave the people who don't exist. Who is going to make all those products these people seem to think they deserve?

Anarchist and Statist are on the exact opposite sides of the political scale. Libertarians our the closest you can get to true anarchists; as, Libertariians want the smallest government possible. Check this out:http://www.friesian.com/quiz.htm

David Nolan came up with a test and the Nolan Chart. You can also think of it as a line with anarchy on one side and total state control on the other, with conservatives and social liberals fighting over how much control the government has in telling you how to live your life.Socialists (not liberal. The co-opting of that word is my pet-pive) want the government to tell you how to spend your money, and conservatives want the government to dictate how you live your life morally. The Statists; communist and progrissives want to do both, and 'true' anarchist believe that there should be no government; we should be able to work things out on a personal level.

There now we can have a discussion with some commen definitions. :-)Josh

There is a very agreeable form of anarchism which is not as well, known as the communist flavor.

Anarcho-Capitalists, support a society where every interaction is voluntary and personal property rights and the non-aggression principle are a priori.

They support the Austrian form of free market capitalism that the Libertarians also support. Not the corporatism we have now.

They are very rigorous in their assertion that all rules must be universal in order to be valid. i.e. if one person has a right to tax, then all people have the right to tax and thus there is no point in taxation. It's the ultimate in equality under the law. If the majority want something, like roads, schools, and defense, then the majority will pay for it willingly.

It's an interesting ideology which only fails in that it's impossible to implement in today's society... but in the future who knows.

"Anarcho-Capitalists" and this statement "It's the ultimate in equality under the law" don't go together.

I "love" made up words and fraises that don't really discribe what it they're ment to describe. Anarcho-Capitalism is just at its heart a form of Laissez Faire Capitalism. For there to be laws there has to be a authoritative body to in force the law i.e., government or governing body, so therefore no anarchy.

To have laws or rules you have to have an in forcing body. If not they are not laws or rules, they are suggestions.

I can say there is a law or rule that no idiots our allowed to make comments on this blog, but with out a way to enforce it It's just a wish I have.

Sigh...I did not decry the theory I made fun of it's name.

You made two assumptions in your last paragraph. 1. That I haven't read the authors you listed, and...2. That I would agree with them and see the error of my ways if I had.You know what they say about assuming things.

You want me to ask a question. Here is one in this statement of yours, "Anarcho-Capitalists, support a society where every interaction is voluntary and personal property rights and the non-aggression principle are a priori." If every action is voluntary the then it's up to you if you want to follow the rules/laws or not, wright? How our personal property rights enforced if non-aggression principle is a priority? I love theories that to work rely on every one just doing what is right.

If everyone would just get along and do what is right the world would be a better place. See I just solved all the worlds problems. Now where's my Nobel Peace Prizes.